If $7,500 isn’t enough to motivate you to move to Vermont (see yesterday’s main story), then maybe this will: Vermont just joined the growing list of states swearing off single-use plastics by adopting the nation’s broadest restrictions yet on shopping bags, straws, drink stirrers, and foam food packaging. The new law, which takes effect in July 2020, prohibits retailers and restaurants from providing customers with single-use carryout bags, plastic stirrers, or cups, takeout, or other food containers made from expanded polystyrene.
Multiple states have banned one or more of these plastics. But Vermont is the first to ban all four products in a single bill. Plus, while a few states have banned disposable plastic bags, Vermont has taken an extra step by promoting bag reuse and discouraging bag makers from skirting bag bans by making them thicker. As a result, the Vermont ban outlaws plastic carryout bags that do not have stitched handles.
So, you might be asking: why would Vermont banning single-use plastics make me want to move there? Well, because you’ll be living in one of the greenest states in America— both in terms of its policies and its nature.
